


Close Your Eyes, I'll Tell You a Story

by MysteriouslyNotNamed0_0



Category: Epic Mickey
Genre: Child Death, Gen, did u ever wish you could read an increasingly graphic depiction of the thinner disaster???, it's not that graphic but lots of people kinda die, jamface and markus are only there for a second, jamface and prescott are like implied to be gus's sons rip, now's your chance!!!, this has been sitting around for fifty years in my computer whoops
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-05
Updated: 2016-11-05
Packaged: 2018-08-29 04:19:00
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,892
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8475061
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MysteriouslyNotNamed0_0/pseuds/MysteriouslyNotNamed0_0
Summary: Mickey insists he wants to know what happened that one fateful day when he spilled paint thinner into Wasteland, and after a lot of convincing, Gus gives up and tells him.





	

"Okay, Mickey. Imagine you're sitting outside, maybe on your roof, taking a break from work and listening to the world go by beneath you. Everyone is running about, bustling, and everything is normal and soothing. Imagine that bustle of a suburban city, for a minute.

Now think of the ice cold that trickles down your back when all that noise fades into a confused silence. Think about sitting up, more confused than afraid, looking down to see everyone turned towards the end of the street. They aren't even talking among themselves, they just stand, holding their children close and adjusting their weight from foot to foot. 

Turn to look at what they see that's got them so still. Miles away, clouds are darkening and the world looks dead. Despite the ominous horizon, you aren't afraid. Those people holding the handles of baby carriages down there, those children holding hands- years later, Mickey, you can still see them so clearly some days - they aren't afraid, either. Because they're safe here. You all know you're safe here. Despite the terrible things that have happened, despite losing yourself and being torn to shreds by the people who once loved you.... Imagine Wasteland as a paradise, Mickey - imagine how the water used to be clear and the buildings soared into the sky. Think of how many lost, terrified, and angry toons landed face down in this world, how long it took to get them to trust anyone again, after an entire world of people destroyed their lives. Think about how wonderful a place this was, with hundreds of thousands of toons who burned as bright as if they still had hearts after they had been met with so much love here. Our wounds only reminded us how much we had to fight for.

Imagine those trusting and kind toons staring anxiously up to the sky, not a thought in our minds that this could be really bad. We had a strong family as our leaders, we had a sorcerer protecting us from ever being harmed again. Why would we expect anything but goodness to fall from the sky? I see that look, Mickey, but you said you wanted to hear and I'm not through.

Now imagine our confusion as a single bottle fell from the distant sky into our world, growing in size until it was clearly visible even here, so many miles away. Imagine the air sparking as some toons began to move anxiously, as their fur stood on end and their fists clenched and their tails began to swish. Look down, squint into the horizon as a fear you don't understand makes your muscles burn and ache to run. 

Close your eyes, Mickey, and watch a huge tidal wave rise above those skyscrapers and come towards your little town quick as the wind. You see it? Look down now. Do you see that man, scooping his two children into his arms? Because I still see him every day of my life. It's not the sort of thing you can simply forget. You can't take your eyes off him, can you? Now imagine fuzzy voices slowly reaching your ears, and imagine yourself turning and flinging someone from your arm in a panic. Imagine the sinking horror when your eyes clear and it's your son and he's wringing his hands and begging you to move, move, move for the love of all that is-

Yes, I stopped there for a reason. That's when the wave hit. That's the moment when everything went silent, when our hearts should have been pounding furiously in our ears. The moment you still wake up screaming to, years later. Do you know how strange it is, to be woken up by the sound of nothing? To swing your blankets off, screaming and screaming to make that silent noise go away? And you wonder why I never sleep with you guys. 

The silence lasts almost a minute, I've guessed. Nothing but a strange lapping of waves and heavy breathing. Finally, finally, somebody shrieks at the top of their lungs, and the street comes alive. Dozens of voices; wordless keening, screaming for help, and sobbing. Begging for someone to stay with them, begging for someone to save them, begging for death. (You stop shaking, Mickey, I'm not done yet.) Above that awful noise you hear a familiar voice, and you finally turn and slowly focus your eyes on your nephew. His fingers are digging into your arm so tightly you can't feel your hand, and the frantic look in his eyes breaks you a little more. And all you want to do is pull him close and gather him up and hold him until he's not afraid anymore. But everyone else up here is flocking down to the street, and I know you can't fly, Mickey, but imagine some more. Imagine looking past your nephew and seeing that same man from before - the one with his two children - balancing at the edge of this deep river. Notice he only has one child in his arms now, and even from here you can see the way he turns his daughter's face against his chest, and you know his other girl is under that river, and something else shatters inside of you. 

Imagine having to physically tear your terrified little boy off your arm, going against every single instinct you have just so you can talk to him without hurting yourself. Imagine watching your friends and family swinging so close to that deadly river and telling your nephew he has to do that too. Can you understand how it hurts to actually watch him force down his terror and dive down to the edge of the river? Because that pain still burns. 

And as he leaves, you remember everything else. You yourself may not be a leader of a clan, but I am. I'm a father, too. And as soon as I sent Markus away, all of that flooded back. Try to imagine that. Imagine suddenly remembering you have hundreds more people to be worried for, hundreds of them who may be dead or alive or injured, and two of them your own sons. Don't apologize, not yet, Mickey. I'm still not done. You take a moment - this whole ordeal, it's only been moments since the tidal wave settled over my quiet town. Take a moment to look over the mess that was earlier a dusty street. 

And it's so loud now, you want to tear out your ears. Everything's happening at once - take my hand, it only gets worse from here. Close your eyes, keep imagining this. Who do I look to first? That woman clutching the handle of a baby carriage, smoke rising from the other end of it and the carriage nowhere to be seen? The two teenagers over there, each one covered in smoking green sludge and thick, running ink? That man, struggling to pull himself out of the river? Imagine you finally catch sight of your child, streaking over to that one and taking one hand and yanking hard. Imagine, just for a minute. You haven't seen your youngest son since the tidal wave hit, and the first thing you see him doing is trying to drag someone five times his size, at least, out of a raging river of acid. Your hands are cold, Mickey - don't worry, I'll stop soon. Imagine watching down for a moment, as someone else flies over to help him. Imagine that man tumbling out of the river, and seeing that he's gone from the stomach down. Nothing but thick gobs of ink, spilling into the river behind him. Imagine that, because that's when you knew how bad this was. And you have to watch, because you're still in shock and you can't move your eyes, as your son and his friend fall backwards with the weight of this man, and you have to watch their faces fill with horror and stumble to explain what's wrong to him. You watch the color drain from his face and you watch him go limp and you don't stop the tears anymore and you dive down to turn your son and his friend's sopping eyes away and it's finally real.

Now be quiet, Mickey, I'm nearly through. The disaster happened five minutes ago, but it feels like longer, and the death toll still hasn't reached its peak. Everything else goes fast, all the next hours blend together. You're down there, feet hovering inches above that deadly substance, hands slipping as you desperately try to pull just one more toon out of this mess. Mickey, you've fallen into thinner before, you know how much it burns as it eats through your clothing and your fur; and do you remember once when your gloves melted to your paws, and we had to take a week out of our adventure to fix that? Think of that happening, but in the hundreds. Think of tiny children, putting their paws in my hand and asking me through tears what happened and why does it hurt so bad. Think of ink and clothing, melding together so badly the marks and pain never go away. Yes, it happened to me, too; not as badly as some, but it did. 

Imagine glancing to your side as you help pull a panicked boy away from the edge of the bank, and you see, through that haze of tears that just won't stop, that your friend's cheeks are wet too. Can you try to imagine hundreds of us, smiling and talking soothingly while our voices shattered and our throats closed up, as fresh tears ran down our faces and the toons we were saving didn't say anything because they wanted to cry, too? Have you ever held a terrified baby in one arm and grabbed a half-melted wrist with your other hand, trying to save as many toons as you could at once? How many died in my arms? You don't want to know.

And it wasn't until that night that I even got a chance to know if my oldest son had lived. Can you believe it? Imagine not being able to call him, not being able to take even a minute to pop over to Ostown and check on him, because that moment I spent there could mean other lives lost here. It was a whole day of death and terror and hairpin decisions, it was the most terrifying day any of us had ever seen. And we never even saw the end of it, because even this many years later, we still hurt. All those toons, whose trust we had slowly built back up from pure betrayal and hatred, are back to square one. They finally believed this place was safe for them, and then this happened. Do we blame you? Do we hate you? We aren't the sort to hold grudges like that, Mickey, you should know that by now. We spent so long looking for someone to blame, and having no one to blame, that we just don't care anymore. Why should we attack you for something you did decades ago? You're doing your part to fix your mistake. That's all that matters now, Mickey, dear boy. That's all that matters now. Go to sleep now. I won't tell you any more tonight."

**Author's Note:**

> SO I wanted to write a nice, painfully graphic description of what Totally Went Down in Wasteland that day, and it turned into this mess. Thanks if you read this far!


End file.
